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Darren Criss
'Darren Everett Criss, '''born February 5, 1987, is an American singer-songwriter and actor. He rose to fame portraying Harry Potter in the fanmade hit musical, ''A Very Potter Musical and A Very Potter Sequel and also A Very Potter 3D: A Very Potter Senior Year. He portrayed the character of Blaine Anderson on the Fox TV show Glee, an openly gay student who transfers from Dalton Academy to William McKinley High School to be with his now husband, Kurt Hummel. Personal Life Criss was born in San Francisco, California, the youngest son of Cerina (née Bru) and Charles William Criss, a banker and a former director of the San Francisco Opera, the Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra, the Stern Grove Festival, and San Francisco Performances. Criss is Eurasian; his mother was born in the Cebu, Philippines, and is of Chinese, Spanish, and Filipino descent, while his father, a native of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, is of Irish descent. He has an older brother named Charles "Chuck" Criss (born April 15, 1985), a musician and member of the indie rock band Freelance Whales. In 1988, the Criss family relocated to Honolulu, Hawaii, where Criss's father started the East West Bank, servin g as Chairman and CEO. They lived there until their return to San Francisco in 1992. At the age of five, Criss began taking violin lessons and continued his classical training up through university. He eventually became a multi-instrumentalist, mastering the guitar, piano, cello, mandolin, harmonica, and drums. Criss attended private schools in San Francisco. He completed his elementary education at Stuart Hall for Boys, and later graduated from Saint Ignatius College Preparatory in 2005. Career Darren Criss first decided he wanted to be an actor when he watched Aladdin and decided he wanted to be a genie. He realized that the genie was played by Robin Williams - an actor, and that's when he decided he wanted to be one himself. On the Web/Local Theatre That Media Show Darren was the original host of That Media Show, a San Francisco short-form web series which discussed Hollywood, filmmaking and visual effects (early episodes are available on iTunes). Little White Lie Though often considered a StarKid production, 'Little White Lie' was a webseries Criss was part of two years before Team StarKid was formed. Many of the Team Starkid members are in it. Criss played one of the main character's love interests on the show. StarKid Productions Criss is a major actor in the theater production group Team Starkid, formed by musical theater students at the University of Michigan. His most popular role with Starkid was Harry Potter in both A Very Potter Musical (which went viral in the summer of 2009) and A Very Potter Sequel (which premiered in May 2010). He is credited with writing half of the songs in A Very Potter Musical and all of the songs in A Very Potter Sequel. The popularity of the musical gained Darren many fans within the Harry Potter fandom. In the fall of 2009, Starkid created an original musical entitled Me and My Dick He was originally cast as one of the main protagonists, Dick, but he was a recurring role in TV series Eastwick during the show rehearsal, so Joe Walker was chosen instead to play the role of Dick. In spite of his involvement in the TV Series, he wrote a few songs and played guitar in the band for the musical. Darren wrote the music for the StarKid production Starship, an original musical about "a far off world inhabited by a race of giant alien insects" and Bug, who "has never quite fit into bug-society and inside the pus-vesicles that serve as his heart longs for something more." The show was performed live from February 11 to the 23rd at the Hoover-Leppen Theatre in Chicago. It premiered on YouTube on April 30, 2011. Many StarKid fans are possessive of Darren because they claim to have discovered him before Glee, something that Darren himself has acknowledged, but he says that his fans are the reason he is where he is right now, and he doesn't want to distinguish them as StarKid or Glee fans. Darren and Starkid also announced that would be doing a presentation of A Very Potter 3D: A Very Potter Senior Year early this past summer. LeakyCon 2012 hosted the first and only presentation of it during "A Very StarKid Event II" which took place from 12pm to 3pm on August 11, 2012. It was posted online on March 15, 2013. Source Life of Leopold Darren Criss uses his voice for the Funny Or Die sensation Life Of Leopold. He is the voice of the title character Leopold Bonar. The pilot and Parts 1 through 5 have been released so far. Life of Leopold Music His music career includes his first self-produced EP "Human," which was released during the summer of 2010, and includes five songs. The album is available for download on iTunes. Songs are: # Human # Sami # Jealousy # Don't You # Not Alone He started plans for a full-length album before he was hired for Glee, and has plans to do so in the near future. He has many other original songs, and performs regularly at various venues in Los Angeles. He is also featured in Charlene Kaye's songs "Skin and Bones" and "Dress and Tie," and her music video for "Magnolia Wine." He has also written and performed several times his original song Stutter and other songs written for Starkid productions. The date of release for Criss's first full length album has yet to be determined, although it might feature songs premiered on his sold out 16-city United States 2013 summer tour (Listen Up!) which took place from May 29 to June 30. Television Darren played Josh Burton, a minor recurring character and possible love interest for Mia, on ABC's short-lived drama, Eastwick. He also appeared on an episode of Cold Case, "Free Love" as the '69 version of Reuben Harris. Broadway Darren made his Broadway debut on January 3, 2012, in a three week stint in How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying as lead character J. Pierrepont Finch. He took over the role from Daniel Radcliffe who originated the role in this revival of the classic show. Rehearsal for the show took place during the Glee winter hiatus, and Darren was given a three week break from production for the performance. He's playing Hedwig in''Hedwig and the Angry Inch'' for 12 weeks starting in April 29th, 2015 until July 19th, 2015. Film Darren filmed the movie Imogene during the early portion of filming the third season of Glee. He plays the character Lee opposite the film's star, Kristen Wiig's Imogene. The film also stars Annette Bening and Matt Dillon. It premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival. Imogene was released under the title Girl Most Likely ''on July 19, 2013. He's going to star in the romance comedy film "Smitten!" Music Videos In 2014, Darren appeared with Jessica Szohr in the music video for ''Already Home by A Great Big World. He also appears in Katy Perry's music video - 'Last Friday Night' along with his Glee co-star Kevin McHale.'' '' In 2013, Darren appeared in Capital Cites' music video - "Kangaroo Court" in the role of the High Rolling Bulldog - The owner of the Kangaroo Court. Glee Criss auditioned for Glee a couple of times, including an audition for Finn (with a cover of The Little Mermaid's "Part of Your World"), before landing the character of Blaine, a student at a rival school. He cut his curly hair when he auditioned for Blaine. Blaine is an "out-and-proud student" and serves as a mentor to Kurt as he struggles through being bullied at McKinley. It was rumored his character would be a love interest for Kurt Hummel, and this has now become fact in the episode Original Song when Kurt and Blaine began a relationship. Glee creator Ryan Murphy stated, "Darren has a major, major arc... He sort of becomes Kurt's mentor and then maybe love- he had to leave his own school because of bullying and goes to an all-boys academy and finds acceptance because that school has a no-bullying, zero-tolerance policy. Kurt really admires and respects Blaine. He plays someone who's one year older than Chris' character, so he's the old pro." Although in the third season episodes he has been recognized as a junior in high school, a year behind Kurt. Darren's first song on Glee ''(which was arranged and backed by Tufts University's Beelzebubs), ''Teenage Dream, hit number 8 on the Billboard charts, selling 214,000 singles in its first week. It surpassed "Don't Stop Believin'" for the highest first-week sales of any Glee song. The show's rendition of Journey's "Don't Stop Believin'" landed at #2 last May when it sold 177,000 copies. Source Many of his other songs sung in later episodes also reached the top ten on iTunes. Links and Social NetworksModifier * A Very Potter Musical * Facebook * IMDb * Instagram * iTunes * Official Website * Pinterest * News Page * Team Starkid * Twitter * Vine * YouTube Trivia * His trademark accessory is his hot pink sunglasses. * He went to a college-preparatory high school. * He is a San Francisco native. * He went to University of Michigan and graduated in 2009. * Darren has a Bachelor in Fine Arts in performance and acting from the University of Michigan. * Darren's brother, Chuck Criss, is a member of the band, Freelance Whales. * He is half-Filipino and half Irish. * He used to live in Hawaii. * He is a tenor. (Source) * Darren can play the piano, guitar, digeridoo, panflute, violin, cello, harp, drums, mandolin, ukulele, kazoo and harmonica. * He can speak and sing in Italian. Video * Darren can speak many languages, such as Italian, which was his major in college, and some Japanese (was his elective language in college), German, Portuguese and French (his three European Language electives at the University of Michigan) and Filipino (specifically, Cebuano) since he's Half-Filipino. * He notoriously forgets the lyrics to his own songs. * He says he "swears like a sailor." * He claims that he can't cook very well, and pretty much lives on Hot Pockets and takeout. * He describes himself as a ho-hum random guy, and 'not just some floozy'. * He considers himself to be an actor who attempts to sing, as his degree is in acting. * Before starting on Glee, he sang his own renditions of some Disney songs at a Maggiano's restaurant every Thursday * He originally auditioned for the role of Finn Hudson on Glee. * Darren has a "cool crush" on co-star Heather Morris. * He's close to Chord Overstreet, Lea Michele and Harry Shum Jr.. * Daleastreet is the friendship term for Darren, Lea and Chord. * He was the first mentor on The Glee Project and guest starred in the episodes Individuality and Pairability. * Darren cut his hair before his audition for Blaine Anderson on Glee, in order to look more the part of a dapper school-boy. He admits that he would have never admitted to cutting his hair for an audition had he not gotten the part. * He hates the hair gel they use on him. * He won a Teen Choice Award for Breakout TV Star in 2011. * The Glee cast voted him as the Biggest Nerd alongside with Harry Shum Jr. * In the episode "Blame It On the Alcohol" Blaine says to Kurt "Best Party Ever!" and in Katy Perry's music video for "Last Friday Night" his character Aaron Christopher says to Katy "Best Party Ever!" * He wrote his first song, Human, when he was fifteen. * He wrote every song for Team Starkid's 'A Very Potter Sequel' and Starship. He co-wrote with AJ Holmes on A Very Potter Musical. * He had a small cameo role in Katy Perry's Last Friday Night music video, playing a character named Aaron Christopher (a parody of his own name) along with fellow Glee co-star Kevin McHale. Video * He played the role of J. Pierrepont Finch in the Broadway Musical "How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying" from January 3, 2012 through January 22, 2012. His 3 week stint set box office records for the highest grossing 3 weeks of the entire run. * He is the voice actor for Jann Lee in the video game Dead or Alive: Dimensions. * He guest starred in the animated show "The Cleveland Show" as Hunter, a Jewish teen pretending to be a Christian. * He hosted the 13th annual Broadway.com Audience Choice awards. * Subsequently, he won the "Favorite Replacement Award" for his role as J. Pierrepont Finch. * Has sang for US President Barack Obama and guests at Obama's LGBT Fundraiser in Beverley Hills in June 2012, this was originally supposed to be pop singer, P!nk's event but she had to drop out. * He is the second member of the cast to sing for the president, the first being Amber Riley. * His first most surreal moment since becoming a Hollywood star is when he was being introduced to Mariah Carey by Whitney Houston. * Darren Criss was one of People Magazine's Sexiest Men Alive in 2011. * He topped the AfterElton Hot list 2 years in a row in the #1 spot. * He was number 69 on BuddyTV's 100 Sexiest Men of 2012. * He is a fan of Conan and it was a dream come true when he was able to have an interview with him.Source * Darren co-starred with Mae Whitman in 3 episodes of Lisa Kudrow's web series, "Web Therapy." * He co-hosted the 2013 Teen Choice Awards with Lucy Hale. * He hosted the 2014 NewNowNext Awards. * He was nominated for the 2014 Peoples Choice Awards 3 times: For Blam, Klaine, and for himself as actor. * He played a role in the music video of Kangaroo Court by Capital Cities. His character was the bulldog. * Darren will voice a Studio Ghibli movie for the second time when he provides the voice of Sutemaru in "The Tale of Princess Kaguya." * Darren voices Micro in the animated movie, Stan Lee's Mighty 7. * He is the voice of Sideswipe in the upcoming "Transformers: Robots In Disguise" animated TV series. * He's made a Broadway Comeback as Hedwig in the play "Hedwig and the Angry Inch". * He wrote the songs Rise and This Time in Glee. * He said that Hedwig in Hedwig and the Angry Inch is his Dream Role. Quotes “Hi, I’m Darren. I like beaches, sushi, and small animals who are nice.”